The Latest

Sundance Institute Brings $80 Million to Utah With 2012 Sundance Film Festival
Park City, UT — Sundance Institute today announced that the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, which took place in Park City, Utah, in January, generated an overall economic impact of $80 million for the State of Utah, according to the independent annual economic and demographic study conducted by the University of Utah’s Bureau of Economic and Business Research at the David Eccles School of Business (BEBR).
The Economic Report, posted in full on the Sundance Institute website, also found that the 2012 Festival: supported over 1,731 jobs; generated over $69 million in media exposure; provided nearly $6.9 million in tax revenue; and was attended by more than 46,000 people, a 2% increase over the prior year.

Spring Now Playing
Check out these Sundance Institute and Sundance Film Festival supported films hitting theatres across the country this spring.
Opening Friday, April 27:
Restless City, directed by Andrew Dosunmu
sound of my voice, directed by Zal Batmagli
Opening Friday, May 11:
Under African Skies, directed by Joe Berlinger
Opening Wednesday, May 16:
Elena, Andrei Zvyagintsev
Opening Friday, May 25:
Oslo, August 31st, directed by Joachim Trier
Opening Wednesday, May 30:
5 Broken Cameras, directed by Emad Burna and Guy Davidi
Opening Friday, June 1:
HIGH School, directed by John Stalberg, Jr.
Opening Friday, June 8:
Safety Not Guaranteed, directed by Colin Trevorrow
DVD Releases:
Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie, directed by Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim
Kinyarwanda, directed by Alrick Brown
Crime After Crime, directed by Yoav Potash
We Were Here, directed by David Weissman.

Seven Sundance Institute | Time Warner Foundation Fellows Selected for 2012
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute and the Time Warner Foundation announced today the seven artists selected for the 2012 Sundance Institute | Time Warner Foundation Fellowship Program. Each Fellow was identified by one of the following core programs of the Institute: Documentary Film Program, Feature Film Program, Film Music Program, Native American & Indigenous Film Program and Theatre Program.
Fellows attend an annual Lab and receive continued support from the Institute, including mentoring, strategic granting, attendance at the Sundance Film Festival and participation in screenplay readings, work-in-progress screenings and related programs and events.

Native Lab Fellow Aurora Guerrero Reflects on a frenetic Festival
It’s been months since premiering Mosquita y Mari at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival and I think I’m still in a daze over the whole thing. It came and went like the unpredictable weather patterns here in Northern California. I remember calling my spouse when I had first arrived in Park City, a few days before my premiere, and sharing that I felt like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz – straight picked up off the ground and dropped into another world.

Something for Mom: Sundance Flicks with Memorable Mothers
Mother’s Day is this Sunday. Of course, you already knew that. Because while it may not be the paramount holiday of the spring season, we nonetheless treat it as such—and rightly so.

Rachel Perkins’s ‘Bran Nue Dae’ Creates a Sense of Cultural Pride in Mexico
Australian director Rachel Perkins wanted the world to see Aboriginal people in a different way. Their culture had been negatively represented in cinema repeatedly over the years, and Perkins wanted to change that. In Bran Nue Dae, the story of a marginalized people is told in a vibrant, musical comedy that reached an audience of more than 8.

Sundance Institute Selects Four Projects for 2012 NativeLab Fellowship
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute today announced the four fellows and projects selected for the 2012 NativeLab Fellowship, a two-stage development program that provides continuous and direct support to Native American, Native Hawaiian, and Alaskan Native film artists. For the first stage, filmmakers participate in an intensive five-day workshop (May 23-27) on the homelands of the Mescalero Apache Tribe, where they receive guidance from seasoned artists including Fenton Bailey (Inside Deep Throat; Party Monster, The Eyes of Tammy Faye), Adam Bala Lough (Bomb The System, The Carter), Billy Luther (Miss Navajo, Grab) and Zach Sklar (JFK, The Feast of the Goat). The second stage brings Fellows to the Native Forum during the 2013 Sundance Film Festival and provides opportunities networking with film professionals who advise them on the business of cinema.

Sundance Institute Selects 13 Projects for 2012 June Directors and Screenwriters Labs
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute today announced the 13 projects selected for its annual June Directors and Screenwriters Labs, taking place at the Sundance Resort in Utah from May 28 through June 28. Under the leadership of Michelle Satter, Founding Director of the Institute’s Feature Film Program, and the artistic direction of Gyula Gazdag, the projects selected for this year’s program include emerging filmmakers and projects from the United States, Italy, Romania, Australia, Algeria, France, Chile and the UK.
Directors Lab Fellows work with an accomplished group of Creative Advisors, professional actors and production crews to shoot and edit key scenes from their screenplays.

Sundance Institute to host public ShortsLab filmmaking workshops in New York, Seattle and LA
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute today announced it will host its popular series of one-day, public ShortsLab filmmaking workshops in New York, Los Angeles and for the first time, Seattle. This series marks the third year of ShortsLab programming for the Institute. Tickets are available at http://www.

Inside the Sundance Institute Istanbul Screenwriting Lab: A Fellow’s POV
Paris, France — Throughout the years, everything I had heard about the Sundance Labs had been completely appealing. I had viewed them from a distance with great interest and curiosity. The closer encounter happened through !F, (the Istanbul International Film Festival) early this year.

Sundance Institute and Hammer Museum Host Free Public Screening of Work-In-Progress Documentary Fil
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute with Hammer Museum will host a free, public, work-in-progress screening of Cooked by award-winning filmmaker Judith Helfand on Wednesday, May 16, 7:00 p.m. at Hammer Museum.

Bran Nue Dae Hits Home with Imperial Valley Students
Imperial Valley and Australia would appear to be in diametric contradiction to one another. One resides in the Northern Hemisphere, while the other sits well below the equator. One is home to a Spanish-speaking majority, and the other’s national language is English.

Our Return to Morocco
On the heels of an incredible Imperial Valley program currently under way, FILM FORWARD journeys to the Kingdom of Morocco for the second year with our strong repeat Program Collaborator, the U.S. Embassy in Morocco.

Filmmaker Jessica Oreck on How She Came to Make ‘Aatsinki—The Story of Arctic Cowboys’
Jessica Oreck is a filmmaker whose work focuses on issues of ethnobiology. Her first feature, “Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo” was released in the US and UK in 2009. Her short film “Venus” played the Sundance Film Festival in 2011.

Reverse Angle: A Programmer Looks Back at Sundance London
It’s officially over. I’m back in our LA office finally able to process what happened over my five hectic days in London. Things can get pretty intense when you’re in “festival mode” so it always takes a little time before you can look back and understand what really just happened.